


Submerge

by Taskir



Category: Pirates of the Caribbean (Movies)
Genre: Drowning, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-21
Updated: 2018-12-21
Packaged: 2019-09-24 10:06:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 506
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17098586
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Taskir/pseuds/Taskir
Summary: The one hoard he still had was time.





	Submerge

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written in 2003, pre-Dead Man's Chest.

It took some time before he forgot to breathe. It wasn’t the first thing to leave him--that had been his heartbeat, and that had happened long before he ever came to rest here. It wasn’t much of a shock, not at first. The information had simply filtered into his mind, unobtrusively. He had opened his eyes after a period of what he defined now as ‘sleep’, and became aware that neither water nor air were going in and out of his lungs.

Once he realized it, terror gripped him and he took in great gulps of water, struggling like he hadn’t for a long time.

After he’d calmed himself, he had time to think. The one hoard he still had was time, and there wasn’t much else to do with all of it besides think, and sleep.

He chided himself for being foolish. Trying to breathe and struggling were nothing more than learned responses. It was what you did when you were in danger of drowning.

They had all done it, even after they realized how far-reaching the curse was. A man would accidentally put a hand on a hot stove, and pull it back--not because it hurt, but because it was what he was accustomed to doing. Merely a learned response. He supposed they were all still doing so--responding and reacting to life as if they were a part of it.

He doesn’t miss them. Not often, at least. He did at first, just as at first he’d struggled, and just as at first he’d breathed. But just as those things one by one stopped being part of him, so too did any real feelings or emotions.

Occasionally he will think of his life. He’ll wake up from his half-dreaming state with a glint of something in his mind’s eye, or a name on his lips.

They’re the most random remembrances of late, too: Roberts’ easy way with a joke. The color of the captain’s eyes. His Joanna’s hands--calloused and plain, adorned with a simple gold circle--the one he had given her.

And his son. He used to think about him the most: how old he might be now, what kind of man he would become. Even with as much time as he has, he’s given up trying to keep track of it accurately--his son could be ten, or twenty, or fifty by now. He could be dead, for all he knows.

He tries to pinpoint when things fell away--tries to give himself at least some nature of timeline. It’s of little use, however. He’s become a husk--empty, hollow, simply one bit of driftwood tied to another, merely existing and waiting for--what? Judgement Day? There’s little chance he’ll die anytime before that.

He doesn’t let such things trouble him. He’s content enough, although he wouldn’t use such a word. So he drifts, letting the ocean’s gentle movement cradle his body, rocking him into a place that’s between dreaming and awake, endlessly, like the very sea herself.


End file.
